Adjusting to having them home again

[Flowerday]

Is it normal to find the adjustment to having them back home (whether for a weekend visit, reading week or longer holidays) utterly exhausting?

I think I go all out to Make Things Nice and Be A Lovely Mother that it really takes it out of me. And/or it’s just the general change of dynamic of having an extra person in the house taking up space and needing feeding/to use the bathroom etc

I guess the answer is I stop trying so hard? Has anyone else got any words of wisdom or just sympathy?!

The household develops a rhythm around those present in it. Anything that changes that rhythm is surprisingly tiring. Children coming back from university is especially so as your don’t have a child back, you have a newly independent adult in the house and that needs its own set of negotiations.

I definitely found the back-and-forth of uni terms quite disquieting, I suspect that’s very normal. It’s weird for them too! Short visits (weekends etc) must feel quite pressurised, like you have 48 hours to demonstrate how much you love them, even though obviously that’s a bonkers way to look at it.

I think young people want to know their parents are happy and productive without them. They don’t want to think that our worlds collapse when they go to uni - it would be really unsettling. So I try to strike a balance between ‘yay it’s good to see you’ (we usually take ours out for a meal on the first night back, and get their favourite snacks in) but also show them that mum has her own shit to be getting on with, just like always. And if they’re disturbing my sleep or blocking the bathroom at inconvenient times, I do tell them (nicely). I think that’s less weird for them than me turning into a cap-doffing concierge whose needs don’t matter.

Thanks both, the rhythm thing makes a lot of sense and so does the fact that they are an independent adult. I do make sure DS pulls his weight and respects things when he’s at home, which tbf, he does. But it’s a good reminder, ditto ensuring they see us doing our own thing too.

Yes, it is an adjustment, my first is back properly after graduating and second is at uni now, both stayed within about 90 mins drive so they were/are back quite often but usually not for long except Christmas and Easter. I've got use to it constantly changing now but sometimes I have to think about who is actually in the house on any given night. Also the food shopping, stopping and starting buying the things that only they like. Ds was quite shocked recently to find the other three of us had a whatsapp group without him but we explained it had been set uo when he was at uni and didn't want all our "will you be back for dinner" messages I think he kind of forgot that we carried on without him. We've set up one without DD now for the same reason.

and yes to not dropping everything when they come home.

When DS was away I started going out a lot more both hobbies and socially in the evenings, he was quite shocked when he came home last summer to find "you're never here Mum". But it is important that they don't think you are just at home pining.